Aviation systems use various types of sensors and methods to gather position data to monitor aircraft location for pilot situational awareness, flight separation, and air traffic collision avoidance. Sensors typically include an altimeter/altitude encoder (e.g., a static pressure sensor) and global navigation satellite systems (GNSS) (e.g., GPS) with satellite-based augmentation systems (SBAS) (e.g., WAAS), which may be used independently, or may include other disparate data sources, or a fusion of sensor data, from additional sources such as airspeed sensors (e.g., a dynamic pressure sensor), heading sensors (e.g., gyroscopic, magnetic, non-magnetic, etc.), attitude sensors (e.g., accelerometers, gyroscopes, etc.), and/or vertical velocity sensors (e.g., rate-of-climb). Functional requirements for both sensors and radios (e.g., for conveying such information) are often contained in technical standard orders (TSO), which are design approvals from the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) and other civilian aviation authorities (e.g., European aviation safety agency (EASA) associated with respective TSO equivalents). The TSO will often reference a minimum operational performance specification (MOPS), which contains detailed technical operational requirements, as well as standard and environmental tests required.
Traditionally, TSOs defining design approval requirements for aviation radios and sensors are written for large, manned aircraft. Many design approvals are difficult to implement on unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs). For example, functional requirements related to human interface aspects are difficult—if not impossible—to implement, given that there is no human on-board the UAV. Further, UAVs can present additional challenges in terms of electrical power availability, size, and weight. Additionally, implementing a number of radios on a UAV can present cohabitation problems, and further, typical missions of a UAV can increase exposure to large megawatt radio signals, which can cause damage to unprotected UAVs.
Due to the aforementioned design constraints associated with UAVs and regulatory requirements, it is desirable to provide a system that is capable of addressing one or more of these constraints while still meeting TSO requirements for Mode A/C/S transponders, ADS-B, and TABS devices.